AIMS Report: Cut Public Sector

AIMS Report: Cut Public Sector

A new report by a regional think-tank says Atlantic Canada “could achieve meaningful savings” by bringing its public-sector numbers down to the national average.

That would mean cutting 14,000 provincial and municipal workers, including administrators, teachers, nurses and others, in Nova Scotia and 29,900 in the Atlantic region.

Those 14,000 workers in Nova Scotia account for $836 million in government spending, while the 29,900 represent almost $1.89 billion, the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies said in its report released Thursday.

“These are cold, hard facts,” Shaun Fantauzzo, policy analyst for AIMS, said in an interview Thursday.

“We simply wanted to measure the size and the cost to confirm … the theory that Atlantic Canada’s public sector is larger, and the data shows that.”